There are lots of other ways for progression instead of inflicting more damage because of some numbers.
I think of:
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Just getting better at jumping/slashing/tactics
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Having limited gear that you have to switch out or improve throughout the story
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Gaining new abilities or allies
And just that if you keep “improving” and inflicting more damage and have higher defense, at the same time the opponents become stronger, it would have been the exact same difficulty level if the numbers just stayed the same.
My money is on MusX